Smoke & Lightning: Born To Be Wild (22/?)
MASTER POST
Title: Smoke And Lightning: Born To Be Wild (22/?)
Authors: bloody_adorable and eviltwin
Fandoms: Supernatural RPS
Pairing: Jensen Ackles / Jared Padalecki.
Rating: Adult.
Wordcount: 3,681
Summary: AU. They're born to be wild. At least, Jared is. Jensen's learning, though, and this road-trip that they're on will teach him plenty of lessons. It's a good thing, too, because he'll need what he's learnt when they return and venture onto an altogether more serious step in their relationship. Trust is a major aspect for the both of them and Jensen's will be tested to breaking point as the boys learn how they'll cope together on the road...and off it.
Disclaimer: None of the following is true in any way, and no profit is made from this work of fiction.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
He felt like he'd just left the hospital. He'd thought it was behind him for a little while.
Now, Jensen sat beside Chris's bed, in the Intensive Care Unit, his eyes riveted to the man's bruised and bloody face. The blood had been cleaned up as much as it could, but traces of it were still visible upon his skin. The worst of what Chris had was a broken leg. But he also had a concussion, a laceration across his side, and two cracked ribs. His eye was black and blue, and he had road rash on his forehead. Jensen couldn't take his eyes off him, a constant wash of guilt rolling over him in waves.
Oxygen was being piped through his nose, mostly because his O2 monitor kept going off when he breathed shallowly during sleep. It hissed in the silence of the room. The monitors attached to him blinked and whirred occasionally, but were silent otherwise. The television was on, but the volume was so low that Jensen couldn't hear it. He wasn't watching it anyway.
The private room was spacious, but Jensen kept his chair right beside Chris's bed, turned towards his best friend so that he could watch him. Just maybe Chris would wake up and he could tell him how horrible he felt.
Jensen's eyes dropped to Chris's hand, where an IV was taped. Seeing the small, plastic catheter in his best friends vein -- because of him -- made tears well up in Jensen's eyes. He lowered his head and tried not to make it too obvious that he was overly emotional.
Interrupting the solitude, Jensen felt Jared lean over him. Both of Jared's hands rested upon the mattress, dipping it down as he bent over Jensen. "You okay?" he asked, his mouth brushing against Jensen's neck.
Jensen straightened. He hadn't heard Jared enter the room, and hadn't been able to rid himself of any teary evidence before being found out. He sniffled through his nose and wiped at his eyes. "Yeah," he answered.
"This ain't your fault, Jen," Jared said into Jensen's hair before he pushed away from the bed and set both hands to Jensen's shoulders instead.
Jensen sniffled again, wiped away one stray tear. "Feels like it," he said, looking back up at Chris's battered face.
Jared squeezed his shoulders, trying to smile. "If it's anyone's fault, it's mine."
Jensen didn't want to hear it. He'd been running through his head how he could have done things differently. Maybe he should have told them all sooner. Maybe he should have demanded that they get police protection. Maybe he should have imprisoned each one of them in their own homes until things cooled down.
"No, Jared, it's not your fault," Jared said in a mocking tone, interrupting Jensen's thoughts. "Really, don't feel bad, Jared. I don't blame you and I'm sure Chris doesn't either."
Jensen got the hint. He reached up and curled his fingers around Jared's wrists, squeezing gently. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm so wrapped up in this. I'm sure Chris isn't mad at you. It really isn't your fault."
"I know," Jared nodded. "It's Coulter's. And he'll get his, trust me."
Sighing, Jensen somehow didn't believe him. "When?"
"Soon enough."
Jensen frowned, staring over at Chris. "If I see him, Jay," he began, shaking his head, "I'll kill him."
Jared leaned down again, wrapping his arms around Jensen. He placed a kiss to the top of the young man's head and held him. "No, you won't," he corrected.
"Because you will."
"No," he said again. "Because that'd be an easy-fucking-out. This bastard is going to get caught, and he's going to go through all of the goddamn channels in the right order, at the right time, and he's going to pay for what he did."
Even though it wasn't nearly as violent as Jensen had wanted, Jared's words comforted him. He wiped away a tear that had crept out of the corner of his eye and sighed again. "I gotta go call Doctor Ballantine."
"No," Jared refused.
For the first time, Jensen turned and looked at Jared. "What?"
"No more skipping school."
Offended, Jensen stood from his chair. "Well, excuse the fucking hell out of me," he snapped. "My best friend's just been hit by a car and you want me to pretend things are normal?"
"No," he returned, shaking his head. "I want you to go back to what you should be doing, because your best friend, who has just been hit by a car, yes, would want you to."
Jensen returned the shake of the head, pushing the chair back so that he could move around it, coming face to face with Jared. "I can't just leave him."
"You can, and you will," Jared nodded. "You can come here every night to see him, Jen, I promise you. But you need to go learn to be a doctor so that when someone like Coulter does this to some other poor bastard -- and it will happen, I guarantee it -- you'll be there. And you'll be the best goddamn doctor this side of the country. You'll put him back together just like Chris's doctor did. And you'll remember how it felt. That'll make you better than anyone else."
Sometimes Jared's logic was staggering and made a scary amount of sense. He was wiser than Jensen gave him credit for. Taking a deep breath, Jensen shook his head. "I don't want to."
"I know you don't."
"But you will."
Chris' voice was thick and heavy with sleep and drugs, scratchy enough to make it barely audible. But that didn't stop Jensen from turning when he heard the three commanding words. "Hey," he greeted, sitting back down in the chair. He tried to smile, but wasn't sure if he was successful. "How are you feeling?"
"Like I've been hit by a car," Chris answered. His eyelids were heavy, blinking slowly. "I'm glad you're here."
"Me too," Jensen nodded. "Do you need anything?"
"Cheeseburger and onions?"
Jensen felt a real smile creep across his lips. "Maybe later," he chuckled.
"And for you to get back to school," he said in a whisper.
Jensen nodded. "Alright."
Even though Chris himself had asked Jensen to return to his studies and be the best at it that he could be, he had a hard time focusing. He didn't bother to explain his less-than-enthusiastic demeanor to the professors, for he knew he wasn't in high school anymore. His teachers didn't care about his personal life. They wouldn't make allowances or excuses for him. He trudged through his classes, and when it came time to socialize with his friends at lunch, he only grabbed a cup of coffee from the student union, and headed outside to the quad.
It didn't feel right to keep putting them in jeopardy.
"Too good to sit with us?" a girl asked.
Jensen looked up from his studies, coffee in hand, to find Lynn staring at him. Behind her were the rest of the gang, Adam heading the group as it neared. "H-hey," he greeted. "Um, no, I just thought I'd get some read--"
"We know what you thought, Scrubs," Adam interrupted, sitting down next to him. "Do us all a favor and don't even go there, hm?"
Jensen cleared his throat nervously and pursed his lips. "Look, guys," he said, glancing at each one of them. "I just thought that... I mean, I'm sure you know what happened to Chris. And I don't want you guys to get hurt too, so..."
"So, you just thought you'd save us the heartache and stop being our friend?"
It sounded too cruel when it was put that way. "Well, yeah," he frowned. "Kind of."
"Well, fuck you, Jensen."
He thought he had been prepared to hear such words, had even run them over and over in his head. But when it came down to it, the words stung more than he would have prepared himself for. Wincing, Jensen frowned and looked down at his paper cup of coffee. "Yeah, I'm sorry."
"No, I mean it," Adam snarled. "If you think that we'd just turn our back on you like that."
"Yeah," Lynn agreed, sitting down at the opposite side of Jensen. "I mean, come on. We didn't take that oath with Chris for nothing. We were even thinking about getting secret club patches."
She was grinning when Jensen looked at her, and oh, how he loved the sight of her smile. He returned the grin as best he could and sighed. "I just... I don't want anyone else hurt."
"Well, tough," Adam said, chucking Jensen on the shoulder.
"Yeah," Brian chimed. "That's life, dude."
"I know," Jensen replied.
"You can't very well keep us all duct taped to you, can you?" Brian asked. "And if you take that in a gay way, I'm going to hurt you."
Jensen chuckled, and it felt good to laugh. "No," he said, squinting into the sunlight as he looked up at Brian. "I guess not."
"And Chris is a big boy," Lynn said. "A very hot big boy."
"We get it, Lynn-o," Adam said, rolling his eyes.
"I'm just saying," she giggled. "He can probably make his own decisions. He struck me as a pretty strong guy. He probably wouldn't have lain low, even if you'd asked him to."
"No," Jensen agreed. "No, he's not the kind to lay low, really."
"So see?" she grinned, putting her arm around him. "You're stuck with us."
"Yeah, you loser," Scott said. "Now let's all hug and be fabulous for a second, and then I have to jet. I got stupid fucking English Lit."
The group collectively lowed in hatred for the class. Scott pulled Jensen to his feet and brought him in for a manly embrace, their chests bouncing off of each others. "Later, bitches," he said, and headed off to class in his usual attire of shorts, sleeveless T-shirt, and sandals.
Jensen felt better about everything. He finished out the day on a much lighter note. By the time he got home, he had a spring in his step again. He planned on doing what homework he had before heading over to spend the last of visiting hours with Chris. Sliding the key into the lock, Jensen turned the deadbolt and pushed the door open.
Inside the apartment, Jared was standing in the living room. Trevor was there, on his knees in front of Jared. Jensen's eyes quickly dropped, and saw that Trevor was, in fact, checking the length of a pair of suit pants that Jared was wearing. A furrow formed in Jensen's brow as he stood there, frozen and staring. His eyes travelled back up, finding Jared in a white dress shirt and a tie.
"Hey, honey," Trevor greeted.
But Jensen didn't hear him. Oh, my God, he thought. Someone died. Swallowing nervously, Jensen stared at Jared, wide-eyed. "Chris didn't..." It was one of his worst fears coming true. Some sort of complication must have made Chris go downhill quickly.
Jared looked over at Jensen. He didn't need the young man to continue. "No," he returned. "God no."
Jensen went boneless for a moment, nearly collapsing to the floor. He closed the door behind him, his hands shaking as he re-locked the deadbolt. He shrugged off his backpack and moved closer. "What the hell are you doing?" he asked.
"I'm standing in my living room in a suit."
"No kidding?" He wasn't impressed with Jared's sense of humor. "I thought you'd never wear one of those?"
"Well, not for just any old reason."
"So, why?"
"Why, what?"
He gave him an exasperated glance. "Why the suit, butthead?" he asked again. "I have never seen you dressed like that before. Not even for Jeff's wedding."
"Well, I want to make a good impression."
"On who? Christ?"
Jared smiled. "Guess what happened today?"
"Please, God, tell me," Jensen said, touching his fingertips to his forehead. "Because I think I'm having an aneurism."
Taking a hold of Jensen's wrist, Jared laughed, pulling his hand away from his forehead. "Stop," he chuckled. "Fucking Coulter was pulled over today for a goddamn broken tail light."
The news brightened Jensen up. Eyes still as wide as ever, he stared up at Jared, hopeful. "And?"
"And, because of the warrants on him, they got to search the car and found a shit-load of illegal firearms on him."
Ecstatic, Jensen set both hands to Jared's chest and shoved hard. "Bullshit!" he shouted with a grin.
Laughing heartily, Jared quickly regained his footing with minimal protest from Trevor, and took hold of Jensen's shoulder. "I swear to fucking God," he swore.
"That's unbelievable," he said, astonished. "How dumb is it, to get caught for something to trivial? I thought for sure he'd be one of those guys they never caught."
"Hey, Capone was caught for tax evasion."
"God, what a mind-freak," he grinned. "And you're going to testify?"
He nodded. "I saw him with the shit," he said. "Trevor suggested the suit. I'll dress up like a fucking choir boy if it gets Coulter's ass landed in prison."
"Jeffrey, I swear to God," Stevie called, "if you're not out here in ten seconds, I am going to go to the church without you."
Though she had a stern tone to her voice, they all knew she wouldn't. Jensen and Jared glanced at each other. Jensen had on a collared dress shirt, tinted a pale blue, and black trousers. His shoes shined just like they used to when he lived with his parents. Jared was in a polo shirt; his arms bared enough to show some of the burn. It was bandaged underneath the tight sleeve band, but otherwise open to the air now. The doctors had been keeping a close watch on it. They'd wanted to skin graft, just to be on the safe side, but Jared didn't want it. Reluctantly, they'd agreed to let it heal on its own. It wasn't as aesthetically pleasing as it might've been with more work, but Jared didn't care. He was just covering it with ink as soon as he could anyway. And Jensen had already told him that he didn't care about scars -- as a matter of fact, they were a turn-on.
Finally, Jeffrey emerged from the house. "I had to get more batteries for the camera, alright?" he said, shrugging his shoulders. "You only get baptized once."
"Most times," Jensen nodded.
"Not helping."
Smiling, Jensen shrugged. "Sorry."
"Alright," Stevie said, opening the passenger's side door. Holly was already in the backseat, cooing happily. "Donna and Rock are going to meet us there. Your sister too?"
Jensen shrugged again. "I think so," he said. "She's been staying at Tiffy Weston's house a lot lately, but just because she likes Tiffy's brother, I think. But I'm pretty sure Mom said she'd be there."
"Okay," she nodded. "And then, we're all back here for brunch."
"Got it."
Jensen had smiled like crazy when Jeff and Stevie asked Jared to be godfather to their little girl. He had been so proud. And then they told him that they'd spoken to the pastor at the church and he had given them the go-ahead, with a bright smile upon his face, to add Jensen to the godfather list.
"We have plenty of gay godparents," he told them. "As long as they promise to guide your child in the word of God."
Jeffrey didn't bother to mention that one of the godfathers regularly said Christ's name, even if it was taking it in vain. They had agreed and when they told Jensen he would be included in the godfather status, he'd been speechless.
Standing before the rest of the congregation Jensen didn't feel self-conscious at all, as he thought he would have. Instead, it was almost as if the rest of the people weren't even there. The church wasn't of his religion, but he was comfortable there.
The whole baptismal process was fairly quick, and Holly only cried once. Jared and Jensen promised to protect Holly from evil, and promised to care for her as godparents should.
After church the whole family met up at Jeff and Stevie's house. Shelby bounded around the back yard while the rest of them milled about in the sunshine, enjoying the warm rays. A bike rumbled in the front drive, and Phin eventually poked his bald head out of the back door to join them. After that first night, he had gone to stay at his Dad’s place, even though Rock was barely there right now.
"Phin!" Jared shouted.
Phin made a beeline for Jared and gave him some sort of embrace and handshake that was completely manly and dripping with testosterone. Holding Holly in his arms, Jensen rolled his eyes at her and spoke softly about how ridiculous they were being.
"Why weren't you at the church, dude?" Jared asked.
"Fuck," Phin cursed. "I walk in one of those places, and I'll burst into flames."
Jared laughed with him. They talked for a few more minutes, and then Jared turned around to find Jensen again.
But Jensen was gone. Searching the backyard, Jared found him over with Jeff and Stevie, Donna. He excused himself from Phin's company and moved over to them, while Phin went to talk to his father.
"Hey," he greeted. "You got up and left in a flash."
"Well, you guys were talking," Jensen said.
"For like, two minutes."
"Try twenty, Jay."
Stunned, Jared looked down at his watch. "What?" He couldn't remember what they had been talking so in-depth about, and felt out of sorts all of a sudden. Even though he wasn't one-hundred-percent, he still picked up on Jensen's uneasiness. "What's wrong?" he asked. "You don't like him?"
Jensen shrugged. "He's just..."
"You'll love him," Jared nodded. "If you just give him a chance."
"He's kind of alarming, don't you think?"
Jared looked over at Phin, scrutinizing him. "No," he said. "But you probably thought that of me, right?"
"Not exactly."
A smile flashed across Jared's face. He crept in closer, lacing his arms around Jensen's waist. "What'd you think then?"
His ears were turning red, he could feel them growing hot. But as to why, he didn't know. How he felt about Jared wasn't exactly a secret any longer. "You already know what I thought."
"That I was hot," Jared winked.
"Yeah, something like that."
"Well, right back 'atchya."
Not mirroring Jensen's fears in the least, Chris was released from the ICU and put into his own room on the third floor of the hospital. Jensen was glad for that. It meant Chris was healing just fine. He went to visit him every night, smuggling in a few goodies for him to eat every now and then.
Chris had been thrilled about the news of Coulter's arrest. He had no memory of the accident, but he had no doubt in his mind that Coulter had a hand in it. He asked Jensen about any further retaliation if Jared testified. Jensen had just shrugged and said with any luck, most of Coulter's clan would be put away. Those that were left, well, maybe they weren't smart enough to put an attack together. Or smart enough not to try.
"So, guess who was here today?" Chris asked, sitting up in bed, eyeing the green Jell-O on his tray.
"Dani?"
He looked down at Jensen, who was sitting in the chair by his bed, legs propped up on the mattress as he flipped through a magazine. "Yeah, right," he said. "If she knows I'm here, she hasn't said a word about it."
"That's a shame," Jensen said, looking at the things for sale on the pages of the magazine. "I always thought she was better than that."
"She might be," Chris said. "She's probably just not sure about us still. If she shows up, that shows she still cares."
"She cares."
Chris just shrugged. "Sucks growing up."
"Mm."
"Eat this goddamn Jell-O," Chris told him, handing him the cup of wiggly goo. "Then they won't yell at me."
"Hell no," Jensen laughed, pushing his hand back. "That's your dinner."
"Traitor," he grumbled. "Where's my cheeseburger?"
"I'll bring you one tomorrow."
"Liar."
"Who was here, lame-ass?" Jensen asked. "You get so sidetracked."
"Oh!" Chris rubbed his hands together. "Your friends. Including Lynn."
"Really? Wow, that's awesome."
"Yeah, listen."
"Yes?"
Chris smiled. "Is Lynn single?"
Jensen rolled his eyes. "You're in the hospital with a broken leg, cracked ribs and stitches, and you're still thinking with your dick?"
"Tell me you're not right now."
"We're not talking about me."
"Pussy," Chris grinned.
"Which is the other thing you're thinking about."
"Eat this Jell-O." He tried to pass the container to Jensen again.
"No." He sighed and stood from his chair, tossing the magazine down in his place. "But I will find out about Lynn for you." He checked his watch and reached out to Chris, setting his hands at either side of his friend's face. "I gotta go." He carefully bumped foreheads with him. "I left homework, and if Jared finds out, I'm a dead man."
"Fine," he returned, feigning despair. "Leave me in my incapacitated state."
"God, the drama." He slipped his arms into his coat and headed for the door. Before he left, he turned and looked at his best friend. "Hey."
Chris looked up from his tray, where he had been poking the green Jell-O, mesmerized by its wiggle. "What?"
"I'm really sorry this all happened," he said. "I know everyone's told me that it's not my fault, but I still feel somewhat responsible, y'know?"
Scoffing, Chris rolled his eyes. "Would you get your head out of your ass?" he asked, a slight smile gracing his lips. "Not everything is about you."
Jensen only gazed at him for a second or two before smiling and nodding his head. "Alright, I'm out of here."
Chris watched him go, the door closing behind him, and called out loudly, "Bring me a cheeseburger!"
--TBC--